The Corporation

I finally got around to watching "The Corporation", a documentary recommended to me by a coworker a few years ago. I expected it to be a diatribe against corporations and capitalism, simply that it was evil and we should do away with it. What I found instead was a serious look at the history behind corporations, and the "legal person" theory (you have the 14th Amendment, granting rights to slaves, to thank for that - along with hordes of corporate lawyers).

One of the more interesting characters in the film was a man called Ray Anderson, founder of a carpet company. In the mid-90s, he had an epiphany, after customers started asking about his company's environmental considerations. For people who would take the corporatist position on this, his story is important to note, especially considering he's managed to balance profits with social responsibility. In my opinion, the ethical decline the world has suffered is not due to atheism and lack of religion, but a blind adherence to the almighty dollar. This should give those genuflecting businessmen something to chew on.

The main thrust of the film is that corporations have one inherent evil, a drive for profits that gives them an incentive to ignore long-term benefits in place of short-term profits. The idea isn't that capitalism is bad, but that the way it's currently done - in the case of a corporation responsible to no one - is.

It also gives a good reason to stay away from milk in America. Unless you like bacteria-filled pus, that is. Ick. Glad Japan has the sense to limit rBGH.

My new toy

It can't do Aut-exposure bracketing for HDR, but it oughta take some pretty photos.

Josh and Jenn came to visit

I've been remiss in my writing, so let me say that my friend Josh and his wife Jenn came to visit last week. It was good to see someone from home finally show up here, it'd been more than 18 months since my last visitor. My apartment is rather small and not well-suited to accommodate visitors, nor is my roommate terribly keen on having people crash on our couch for a week (he bitches a lot). So it was a great stroke of luck that my friend Eric from Michigan had to go to western Japan for some business during that time, and graciously opened his apartment to them.

Anyways, hopefully I'll get around to posting the pics, but this weekend's the Tanabata festival, so I won't be in the house much.

Happy birthday America

232 years old today, and your age didn't start showing until about 7 years ago...

Summer plan decided

Well, I was thinking I'd hang around Japan, but with friends visiting now, my folks coming next month, my brother coming in September, and my good friend Miwa just now getting back from Thailand, I'm feeling left out from all the travel goodness. So I've got a flight booked to Singapore on August 1st, the day my parents leave. What I didn't realize is that it's upwards of a couple hundred bucks for a hotel room, and I wouldn't be arriving til about 2am. Thankfully, my college pal Borna came to the rescue and secured a bed for me in her parents' guest room. Score!

I'm not gonna hang around Singapore for 3 weeks, though, since my objective is to spend less money than I would futzing about in Japanland. So I'm thinking of boating over to Indonesia (mind the pirates!) and resting on the beach. I'm thinking about the Riau islands, though this might change depending on what info I can get about it. My idea is to stop off at the Border's in Singapore, load up on books, find a small island with a dive shop and a beach chair, and park my butt there for a while.

That's the plan, though my manic side might take over and I'll turn up in India with a hangover, a sore bum and a missing kidney.

My letter to Senator Obama

What the hell, Senator Obama? I'm extremely disappointed in your support for the so-called 'compromise' on the FISA bill in H.R. 6304. There are times for compromise, and then there are times to stand firm. I've spent so much time defending you to friends and family, telling them you're the right man for the job, that you're interested in getting our country back on track after 8 years of abuse. And many of them had come around. These were Republicans and Libertarians who were going to vote for a Democrat, something they'd villified for so long, because of your statements on reaffirming our civil liberties.

And then this happens. You've soured untold numbers of people by this craven folding to 'compromise.' This is not a compromise, it's giving criminals immunity from prosecution. I expected better from you. So much for Change we can believe in.

If you want my vote in November, you're going to have to work hard to earn it. Because you've just lost yourself a ton of credit.

Sincerely,

Jeremy Eades

A question

Is it good or bad if my biggest concern is whether to wear track pants because they're cooler, or jeans because they'll prevent children from poking their fingers up my butt?

Maybe it's human sacrifice

There's some weird chanting coming from the house right by my balcony. It started around noon, when a friend of mine was over picking something up. He asked me what it was, and we couldn't figure it out. Eventually, we stood on the balcony and could hear it coming from that house. It sounded like that part from Indiana Jones, right before they tore the guy's heart out of his chest. Hope that's not our neighbors.

Derren Brown, Messiah

Dunno if any of you have ever seen this guy, but he's a really talented British magician, and in one show, he goes around the US trying to convince 5 influential members of various kooky communities (including an evangelican preacher) that he's a legitimate practitioner of whatever they're pushing. In it, he claims to be psychic, be able to convert people to Christianity with a single touch (this one got me the most), can read dreams with a magical crystal-powered box, was abducted by aliens and can read people's medical history, and talk to the dead.

Brown's an adept magician, he uses these skills to manipulate people and situations to maneuver them into believing him. The first segment, on remote viewing, provided the most "WTF!? how did he do that?" moment, but the Christianity conversion was the most interesting. I for one, find it pleasurable to have someone touch me, or be near me, but it's nothing religious, I just enjoy human contact. One of my most memorable moments was watching a friend of mine -- Christina, I think -- draw a picture in a cafe in Spain. It was just that feeling of closeness to someone else, nothing more.

He may be a skilled entertainer, but I doubt everything he did was merely psychology. Here's a good video of him reading someone's mind whilst ballroom dancing. Cold reading is a skill I'd love to have, though I don't know that I could only use it for good. Here's a criticism of Derren Brown as well, decrying his claims (on another show) that he didn't use magic. The Youtube video is eight parts, so just look for the next one in the related videos section.